Related

VANCOUVER — Dick Whitlam and his wife Wendy, owners of Aquadel Golf Course, are shuttering their clubhouse for good next month.

The 18-hole course near Cultus Lake, south of Chilliwack, has been in his family since 1958, after his father bought the property two years earlier.

“In our heyday we had 300 members here,” he said. “Now we have 16.

“We call it kind of a tsunami that hit us.”

From the mid-1980s through the 1990s, profits and memberships soared. Aquadel and two nearby golf courses drew from a pool of cottagers and year-round residents from Abbotsford to Hope. Now, with nine other courses in the vicinity, Aquadel attracts players from no further than Chilliwack and Cultus Lake.

Its numbers have been in the red for a decade.

“What we did was just kept taking cuts, down until we were very, very little. That started about ten years ago,” Whitlam said.

The course debt? “It’s enough.”

The course’s final day open is Oct. 8 and the sale of the property to two condo developers will be finalized by the end of the year, pending zoning changes, Whitlam said.

Golf course owners across the Lower Mainland are lamenting a long-term decline in money and members, as rising competition, costs and the shifting interests of a new generation strain their bank books and force them to get creative in attracting customers.

“There’s less and less golfers, middle-class people, taking up golf on a somewhat regular basis, and there seems to be more and more golf courses continually popping up, taking a piece of the pie,” said Delta Golf Course general manager Brian Young. And when higher-end courses lower their green fees, less opulent links have to respond in kind, an example of trickle-down economics gone askew, he said.

“It’s like a price war at gas stations or something. It’s just getting crazy.”

Major expenses include maintenance equipment like specialized lawn mowers and aerators, fuel, fertilizer and insurance, not to mention staff. “It’s been labour rates and fuel costs and the whole shebang, compounded with a stagnant market,” Young said.

Price comparison sites like GolfNow.com, along the lines of Expedia and RateHub, make lower green fees a painful necessity for the more than 90 golf courses operating in the Lower Mainland.

Whitlam pointed out many mid-range clubs halve their rates to around $30 starting at 2 p.m. and lower them further by the hour, luring golfers but leaving greens virtually empty between noon and 2 p.m. “And then all of a sudden, the golf courses start putting the $30 deal on at noon to up those noon-to-2 p.m. times. And pretty soon the whole price structure starts coming down.”

Kris Jonasson, executive director of the B.C. Golf Association, assessed the logic behind these tactics. “Golf is in a lot of ways like a grocery store,” he said. “We have a lot of perishable items. If you have a tee time and it doesn’t get used, you can’t go back and resell it.”

Revenue is not the only challenge.

“I don’t think that there’s any doubt that we are fighting for the recreational dollars and, probably more importantly, the recreational time of people,” Jonasson said. “Time in my mind is the biggest factor.”

From his perch at the clubhouse of Belmont Golf Course in Langley, golf director Mark Forrest — a 32-year industry veteran — has noticed that a new generation of golfers is more selective with their money and less liberal with their time.

“The younger people coming up maybe don’t have the money for initiation fees,” he said.

Membership at Belmont tops out at $6,000, not including $200 in monthly dues. Non-members pay up to $59 for a round of 18 at the height of the season.

“The traditional way was to get up in the morning and go to the club, practise, play golf, have a little lunch, then maybe stay around and play cards. People don’t have time for that now,” Forrest said.

“Golf is a traditional sport, and I like that part of it myself, but now everybody’s text-messaging, everybody’s on the go-go-go, and six hours just isn’t cutting it any more.”

Pagoda Ridge Golf Course opened this summer in Langley less than 10 minutes’ drive from Belmont. Meanwhile clubs like Redwoods and Fort Langley are barely more than a 3-wood’s drive away.

“It’s just a great time to be a golfer,” Forrest admits.

Wayne Hashemoto couldn’t agree more. The retired banker and south Surrey resident has been golfing for 35 years. These days he hits the fairway three to four times a week, usually with his wife Ruth. Their routine demonstrates yet another challenge facing courses in the Lower Mainland: U.S. competition.

The couple purchased a dual membership at Semiahmoo Golf and Country Club and Loomis Trail Golf Club, both located roughly one kilometre south of the border in Washington state and routinely ranked among Golf Digest’s top 75 public golf courses in North America.

“The initiation fee was cheaper than the courses here in the Lower Mainland and the monthly dues are cheaper as well,” Hashemoto said.

He and Ruth paid a combined $12,000 in initiation fees, which includes once-a-month access to several B.C. courses as well.

To keep Canadians golfing on their own turf, Earl Francis has a plan. The former Canadian PGA president and current owner of Cheam Golf Course in Chilliwack sees opportunities in social media.

“We’re just upgrading our website. We’ve got a Facebook page, all those things that probably a lot of golf courses don’t have,” he said. Cheam offers Groupon deals to entice hungry golfers with food discounts. Mondays feature a burger, a pint of beer and a round of golf for $20.

Revenues are down almost 30 per cent from a decade ago, but they’re up from last year, Francis says.

Nonetheless, there’s a limit on what digital deals can do for tee-off rates.

“You know, Chilliwack is not big for Twitter,” he said.

Back at the B.C. Golf Association, Kris Jonasson sees the downswing as a more of a rain check then a permanent flight of golfers from the green. He said in spite of intense competition, golf associations are working together more closely than ever to combat declining revenues.

The Allied Golf Association of B.C., made up of six other golfing associations, held its first symposium this year. Its tentative steps include forming committees to look at how to promote recreational and competitive golf in the province and agreeing informally to start sharing non-private data to track industry trends.

On a deeper level, the industry hopes to change perceptions around the game of golf. “It doesn’t have to be an 18-hole, four-and-a-half-hour round any more,” Jonasson said. “Nine holes are acceptable, six holes are acceptable, or just going out and playing two or three holes in the evening.”

The gradual straightening of golf’s long slice into the rough may yet yield results. But that’s cold comfort for Dick Whitlam, locking his clubhouse for the last time a few weeks from now.

“I’m going to miss it,” he said. “I’m going to miss swinging the club on my own fairway. And I’ll miss seeing my golfers do the same.”

Comments

We encourage all readers to share their views on our articles and blog posts. We are committed to maintaining a lively but civil forum for discussion, so we ask you to avoid personal attacks, and please keep your comments relevant and respectful. If you encounter a comment that is abusive, click the "X" in the upper right corner of the comment box to report spam or abuse. We are using Facebook commenting. Visit our FAQ page for more information.

A Radio-Canada reporter has been arrested for alleged criminal harassment while pursuing the subject of a story. According to Radio-Canada, reporter Antoine Trépanier was arrested Tuesday night by Gatineau police. He was released on a promise to appear in court. Trépanier was called by Gatineau police Tuesday evening and an officer requested that he come […]

Almost Done!

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.

Postmedia wants to improve your reading experience as well as share the best deals and promotions from our advertisers with you. The information below will be used to optimize the content and make ads across the network more relevant to you. You can always change the information you share with us by editing your profile.

By clicking "Create Account", I hearby grant permission to Postmedia to use my account information to create my account.

I also accept and agree to be bound by Postmedia's Terms and Conditions with respect to my use of the Site and I have read and understand Postmedia's Privacy Statement. I consent to the collection, use, maintenance, and disclosure of my information in accordance with the Postmedia's Privacy Policy.